Chapter 18 #2
I see nothing, which is annoying. I’d feel better if I knew what I was dealing with. The only person I consistently spot is a little girl with blond braids, maybe eight or nine, leading an adorable yellow lab puppy on a leash.
They don’t look like any hit squad I’ve ever seen, but the scent and my instincts are telling me there’s a shifter nearby. It won’t be a vamp, not at this time of day.
I can’t risk staking a sweet little girl and her pooch and then finding out I was wrong. I head into another café and order a meatball sub. It smells meaty and delicious, and I gnaw on it as I wander toward an alleyway at the edge of town.
Luca. I call out to him with my mind. Are you there?
Nothing. Fuck’s sake. Men in the morning—they’re all the same.
LUCA! I yell, throwing everything I have at it, all the while trying to appear unconcerned to anyone who might be watching. Wake up, you lazy asshole.
A wave of static hits my ears, and then an amused drawl. Good morning to you as well, darling. Where are you?
It might be morning, but it’s not that good. I’m in town. Think I’ve got a shifter on my tail.
Silence.
I picture him sitting up, scowling, trying to figure out how to come save me on a bright summer day.
I’m okay. All under control.
I take a bite of my sub and let out a groan. My god, this is delicious. And I don’t have to talk with my mouth full while I’m communicating with Luca.
Are you still there? Are you safe, Rosa?
Yeah, sorry. Distracted by meatballs. I’m going to be heading back there with a car, and I need you and Pietro packed up and ready to move, all right?
All right, he answers. Be careful. And we will be discussing this later.
Yeah, yeah. I’ll look forward to the lecture. I casually drop part of my meatball sub as I walk down the alley, then stop and turn around to look. The dog walks straight past it, tail wagging as it ambles toward me with its young owner.
Right. That’s no puppy. Only the best-trained dog would leave a delicious meatball lying on the sidewalk without so much as a sniff. I have a moment of regret, mourning my lost sandwich.
Then I drop everything I’m holding—coffee, fruit, sub—and grab both stakes from my jacket. I sprint toward them so fast the girl looks comically scared, and cannonball right into her. The impact knocks her to the ground, the leash tangles around her legs, and the pup yaps and snaps at me.
I don’t have long, so I slam one stake through her hand, right in the center of the palm, and then I ignore every instinct I have and force myself to drive the other one through the puppy’s paw. Not a puppy, not a little girl, I repeat. But the sounds they make are pretty convincing.
Shit, what if I made a mistake? What if this particular dog doesn’t like meatballs? As I stare at it, though, the snout and floppy ears begin to shrink, and instead of yelping, it barks out a very human “Fuck!”
The little girl is crying like a little girl, but her braids have disappeared, leaving behind a military-style buzzcut.
They can’t change fully back into their human forms while they’re injured, so different parts keep morphing—a hand instead of a paw, an ass instead of a tail, giant size-twelve feet on the child. Yeah. Shifters for sure.
I’d like to question them, but I don’t have time. There’s no one around, but this is a small town, and the noise will attract attention. Leaving my stakes in them, I run all the way to the small parking lot at the edge of Main Street, then slow to a casual stroll.
I don’t spot cameras, but just in case, I keep my hood up and pulled tight around my face.
A man walks toward me with a fluffed-up poodle on a leash, and I inhale deeply.
Human, canine, all entirely normal. Judging by the perfume tickling my nostrils, they’re on their way back from one of the multitudinous grooming salons.
The man clicks the unlock button on his key and is about to climb into a big brown Chevy Trailblazer.
I don’t want to hurt him—or get bitten by a poodle—but I have to risk it.
I grab his face between my hands and stare into his eyes, overwhelming his will with mine.
“I need your car, and you’re going to lend it to me.
I’m real sorry. I’ll leave you some cash in case you need a cab.
You won’t report your car missing until this time tomorrow, okay? ”
He nods witlessly, and I shove some loose bills into his shirt pocket.
I pat the poodle, take the keys, and exit like the proverbial bat escaping hell.
It only takes me a few minutes to reach the motel, and as soon as I pull up, Luca emerges from our room, a sheet thrown over his head and shoulders and Pietro in his arms.
As he dumps my protesting brother in the back seat, I leave the motor running and dash back in for my packed bag. I look around for a few seconds, feeling a weird sense of fondness for the place. It might be a shitty motel room, but I had some great orgasms here.
When I get back outside, Luca is in the front seat, completely covered to protect himself from the sun, and despite the circumstances, I laugh. “You look like Casper the unfriendly ghost!” I exclaim, shifting the SUV into drive.
“Did you kill them?” he growls. “You better have killed them.”
“No. I didn’t have it in me to murder a puppy, even if I knew it wasn’t really a puppy. Where to?”
“Brooklyn,” he mutters from under his sheet, clearly displeased.
“Right. No sleep till Brooklyn it is.”